Tyralak

OK. First, let me say that the cinematography and CGI was truly amazing. I saw it in 3D at the IMAX. The sound was fantastic, and the 3D was great without being overpowering. That being said, I'm going to have to watch it several more times to get all the details and nuances due to the pure sensory overload.

The actors have certainly matured since the previous film. They seemed to have their roles a bit better in mind. Many people objected to the love story between Spock and Uhura as being very un-Spocklike. I disagree. Spock has always had to struggle with his Human side vs. his Vulcan side. It was part and parcel of his character. It always has been. In the last film, the incursion of Nero caused enough disruption, that his life took different priorities. He never was able to develop in the peaceful atmosphere that his counterpart in the Prime Universe did. Thus, he had less chance to master his struggle. The complete loss of control after Kirk's "death" was quite interesting. I could actually see him doing this in the Prime Universe, had the circumstances been right.

Kirk was spot on, and when you really think about it, his unrestrained side had been tempered in the Prime Universe because of the influence of his father. He was deprived of this influence in the Alternate Universe, so his chaotic side was given more free reign, but he was still the same Kirk at the core.

Checkov was still comic relief, but then he always was. Be honest.

Sulu really got to shine a bit more, and I could see many of his qualities from the Prime Universe show up in his character. Especially the scene where he threatened John Harrison. He became a bit of a badass.

Bones was Bones. Spot on, just as he was in the last film.

I was slightly disappointed with the treatment they game Mr. Scott's character. I felt they didn't take him as seriously as they did in TOS. That being said, he was still the genius we all know and love.

Khan. Why Abrams felt he needed to bring Khan into this one, I don't know. I so wanted this film to not have Khan in it. However, the treatment he gave him was very good. In fact, I felt that he mirrored the character in the Greg Cox novels "The Eugenics Wars" very well. If any books should be made canon, it's those. We got to see a lot more of his motivations. He was less of a two dimensional cardboard character than we saw in TOS and TWoK. I really think it would have been a more interesting twist had they make Khan a good guy, and had him work together with the Enterprise then become part of Starfleet later on. Having two sets of villains was interesting, but too predictable. Plus the reactor scene with Spock and Kirk reversed, and Spock yelling KHHHHAAAANNNNNN!!!! was really unnecessary and made me cringe. They should have left that out. Srsly, Abrams. What the hell were you thinking? However, I must say they explained rather well why he was where he was and why. Nero's incursion into this universe really did cause a great deal of upset. Starfleet became much more militaristic, their ships were far bigger and more powerful. Their weapons much more advanced, and their drive systems were wicked fast. They took Mr. Scott's Transwarp beaming technology and created Transwarp drives which rivaled anything we saw in TNG. Because of this, Section 31 became bolder and explored further into the galaxy where they happened upon Khan and his fellow supermen. Interestingly enough, in the conversation with Admiral Marcus, we see models of Starfleet ships on a shelf, and the NX-01 was among them.

Speaking of technology, the accuracy of warp drives was amazing. The Vengeance came out of warp probably 100 meters from the Enterprise to a dead stop. Impressive. The toughness of the ships was also amazing. The Vengeance survived a re-entry after having taken a lot of damage, looking roughly the same as it did in space.

Many people say of the Alternate Universe that there is too much emphasis on action. That this isn't what Star Trek was all about. We have to remember, that just like in the Mirror Universe, the reality and priorities of this universe are very different. In the Mirror Universe, the Terran Empire was reacting to threats from aggressive powers in the area. This affected their mindset much more than we saw in the Prime Universe. The same with the Alternate Universe, but to a lesser degree. Starfleet still had the same focus, but they had different realities to deal with. It makes sense when you stop and think about it. 

In short, Star Trek has never stayed the same. Every series had a different theme and feel to it. TOS was frontier exploration. Cowboy diplomacy, and fly by the seat of your pants. TNG was exploration of the human spirit, diplomacy, and a real fleshing out of the Federation. DS9 was a war series, plain and simple showing life on the front lines. VOY was a Star Trek version of "Lost in Space" showing a ship and crew making the best of a hopeless situation. ENT showed Starfleet in its infancy with all the struggles of standing on your own two feet in the galactic community.

I feel that this film stays with the grand tradition of Trek, adapting to the times. The Alternate Universe is a great way to explore some of the "What if" scenarios that we may have thought of.

Now, being that Abrams has apparently left the Trek franchise entirely, it will be interesting to see if the next director continues in the Alternate Universe, or returns to stories in the Prime Universe. There is no doubt that any future Trek series will be set in the Prime Universe due to licensing issues.

I LOVED the fact that Nimoy was in this film as well. It was a very pleasant surprise, and added to the connection between the Prime Universe and the Alternate Universe.

In conclusion, I think it was a great film, and one that I will watch multiple times when it comes out on Blu-Ray. Abrams certainly isn't perfect with his films, and some things he does makes me squirm in my seat, but I feel that the hate directed at him is more than he deserves. After all, Insurrection and UPN's horrible business decisions regarding cancelling ENT almost killed Trek. Abrams brought it back, and for that he should be appreciated.

I just saw the movie this evening, and I have quite a bit to say about it. This thread is for those who have seen the movie, or people who don't mind spoilers. Once again, THIS THREAD CONTAINS SPOILERS!!!!

s

p

o

i

l

e

r

s

p

a

c

e

.

.

.

.

With lightspeed weapons and ships moving at thousands of meters per second, targeting is an issue.

 

Your weapon may be able to hit something light-seconds away, but if the target moves more than a ship length in a second, it may be gone by the time your energy beam arrives. You can try to predict the target's position and fire to hit it, but evasive maneuvers and ECM can make your predictions unreliable.

 

So, if you want to more reliably score hits, you close the range when targeting anything that can move fast enough to evade a shot that takes a second or more to propagate to the target.

Not to mention, that for the most part, Sci-Fi weapons aren't anywhere near light speed. Especially Turbolasers.

Oooohhhhhh! This is a worthy cause! Giant robots kick ass! This was a good show, BTW.

 Even Tyralak, who HATES almost all of the EU, said that Death Star was a good story.

Well, I don't really hate the EU so much as I find most of it unreliable for debate. About half of it is annoying as fuck, though. *cough* Traviss *cough* KJA.

The "Band of the Hand"? Is that some sort of masturbatory reference?

I know I'm going to be bummed when Roger Corman dies. Whenever you see the marquee on the screen saying "Roger Corman Presents" you know you're in for an evening of cheesy goodness!

Its a bit far-fetched, I know

Actually it makes sense. It has to be something like that, otherwise the only other explanation is that we've grossly overestimated their firepower.

Just a reminder. Since it looks like we in the US are going to be the last ones to see the movie, and a lot of you live in other countries and will get it first, please keep spoilers to a minimum. Or at the very least, use spoiler tags.

This does create a very large problem. Especially since Turbolasers and Blasters are thermal weapons. Perhaps the power level is lowered in the atmosphere? There's also the possibility that they aren't as powerful as we thought. Anyone know what would happen if that much thermal energy was released in an atmosphere?

 

Opinions???

 

Whaddy'all think???

I want one.

Os@m@ will beat them both. With just his fists!

I don't know who Christian Weston Chandler is.

Well, I'm thinking of uploading some piece meal 40K analysis in the coming weeks/month, just basic stuff. Anyone here willing to read over it and give me feedback? The feedback can be on anything really, from errors in math or interpretation, to spelling, grammar and wording ( I admit,eloquent writing  isn't my strong point). Cheers guys! 

Sure! I'd be glad to help!

Anti grav would explain the lack of interaction with the surroundings at very low speeds but I'm thinking to avoid sonic booms would require a more exotic propulsion method or some way of manipulating the air along the ship's path. Even the Acclamators in Attack of the Clones are moving up at space shuttle speeds without making much of a fuss. I look at it as a problem that would have needed solving once a civilization decided it was desirable to have ships as long as a kilometer plus land and take off in any sort of reasonable time you don't want them killing entire states with the airflow of their passing. How they do it, beats me.

 

 

 

This has always been the rub with things. Once you start having to resort to exotic propulsion to account for lack of secondary effects, then the method of calculating power based on acceleration becomes less reliable.

We may have seen more examples of ruthlessness by the Galactic Empire simply because they've been shown in action more, but I know I would rather serve on a ship Galactic Empire than the Terran Empire. In the TE, killing your superior is not only permitted but encouraged as a way of moving up in the ranks...

That's actually a good point. Plus the fact, that in the Terran Empire, they take a perverse pleasure in cruelty.

Also, welcome to the board!

I looked into a couple of spoiler, mainly to see who Harrison really was. If what I'm reading is true, I'm kind of disappointed. However, I'm still very excited about the movie.

Here's the article on Memory Alpha about Memory Alpha.

There's also this at the bottom. Take it for what it's worth.

According to Michael Okuda: "Based on the size and spacing of the windows, I'd estimate that each of the domes must be similar to the Superdome." also "If you look very closely at the far left dome, you might notice a small blue patch on the top of the dome. That's the Memory Alpha emblem."

I have always figured it was a combination of a few factors. One, stories in Star Trek are almost exclusively told from the perspective of the military. Civilian ships are usually not large parts of the story line. Two, the SFX budgets being as limited as they were, the expense of showing large amounts of civilian craft, especially when they weren't important to the story, would have likely been considered a waste of money. Three, space isn't like your standard interstate. It's BIG. REALLY big. Because they aren't in viewing range, doesn't mean they aren't there. I live in the San Francisco bay area, there are a couple of naval bases around here. You don't have a ton of civilian traffic around those bases. If you were filming a TV series based on a navy ship, and you filmed the base, you wouldn't see many civilian ships at all. I suspect it's the same thing in Trek.

The Borg may use some sort of smart material that they can tweak the properties of on the fly but they also have all manner of fields as well. The hull is not likely their main line of defense. Also In the Best of Both Worlds, Borg ships were shown to be faster than a Galaxy class red lining it's engines, the First Contact battle was probably a series of fights like BOBW with various task forces intercepting the cube along its flight path or catching up when it drops out of warp for any reason rather than hours upon hours of constant fighting and bombardment. Trek ships can't take more than a few seconds from a peer in most fights without taking crippling damage, the longest ship to ship battles take a few minutes.

Well, how far is the Romulan Neutral Zone from Earth? It's not exactly around the corner, and that's where the Enterprise was when the battle started. The battle had to be going on for at least that long.

How much of Trek history &/or characters &/or references are in Greg Cox's Khan books?

Quite a bit. Methuselah was in the books along with Ralph Offenhouse and Clare Redmond from "The Neutral Zone" (TNG) Seriously, this guy needs to write for any future Trek TV series. He's an amazing writer.

The Eugenics Wars Vol. 2: The Rise and Fall of Khan Noonien Singh

By Greg Cox

A truly excellent pair of books. I love how he fills in the backstory of how the Eugenics Wars came about, and the role of Gary Seven and Roberta Lincoln in trying to halt their rise to power. I'm about halfway through the second book. It's hard to put down.

I still haven't figured out if you annoy the crap out of me or are hysterical.

He used to annoy me to no end, then his posting style kind of grew on me. He's excellent comic relief. Ask him about a certain "Chinese Laundry".

Here's a couple of pictures of my wife.

Beautiful wife you have there, Brian.